Fedor von Bock

Fedor von Bock (3 December 1880-4 May 1945) was a Field Marshal of Nazi Germany during World War II who commanded German forces on the Eastern Front of the war. He was killed at the end of the war by Royal Air Force bombers while in retirement.

Biography
Fedor von Bock was born on 3 December 1880 in Kustrin, Prussia, German Empire to a Protestant aristocratic family. His uncle was General Erich von Falkenhayn, and Bock served as a Captain on the Western Front of World War I in France, winning the Pour le Merite award for military prowess. He served in the Black Reichswehr during the interwar violence in Germany, and in 1935 Adolf Hitler promoted him to the commander of the Third Army Group of the Wehrmacht. In March 1938, he led the German invasions of Austria and Czechoslovakia, and in 1939 he led Army Group North during the invasion of Poland at the start of World War II. In 1941, Bock was the commander of Operation Typhoon, Nazi Germany's operation to capture the Soviet Union's capital of Moscow. Von Bock succeeded in pushing up to the capital, but in December 1941-January 1942 the Germans were halted and defeated at the Battle of Moscow by fierce resistance from Georgy Zhukov's Red Army. He was relieved of command after the Soviet counteroffensive defeated the German armies, and he went into retirement for the rest of the war. He was killed at Oldenburg by the United Kingdom's Royal Air Force when they strafed his car, although Bock was in retirement at the moment.